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This Caribbean Blog of global reach and appeal is maintained by Bahamian Blogger - Dennis Dames with all readers and subscribers in mind.

Thursday, May 18, 2017

The
Federal Communications Commission (FCC), will begin a rollback of net
neutrality; which is likely to lead to a two tier internet; more extreme
than the current division between the internet you know today and the
ominous "dark net", in which everything from humans to nails seems to be
for sale.

What is important is that large corporations will be able to pay - as some do now - to lock in their web presence at higher speeds, including processes for purchasing.

As usual, whilst in general poor people will suffer the first eddies of
unforeseen disadvantages, also as usual, the Developing World and the
Caribbean - in particular - will be at the bottom of the heap.

I
wonder whether we observe how the global financial and political system
is forming a divide beyond our shrinking opportunities to go to Miami?

Already, all of our telephone calls are recorded; already US visas are
being denied in record numbers; already foreign banks are limiting
credit charging astounding higher fees or just outright leaving our
region, and already, money transfers are being hampered by arbitrary
rules which seem to change daily with little regard for the hardships
caused.

The undermining of net neutrality could prove to be a slow,
imperceptible attack on booking platforms to Caribbean destinations. It
could mean that competitive destinations could pay to have ours down
graded in search profiles, leading to "throttling"; which could mean
seeing our content bunched down with North Korea or countries at the low
end of the development scale.

Although I have no ideology, I am
known as a conservative economist and I do believe in market forces.

However, I reject "trickle-down" theory as barking nonsense. The
assumption of Ajit Pai - FCC Chairman - is the Trumpian belief that if
you remove regulations internet service providers will pass benefits and
potential lower costs to the consumer. (If you believe that, I will
next try to convince you that back hair is sacred).

Here is the
point: the affects may be less harmful than expected. But here is yet
another example of something - alike to climate change - upon which our
future competitiveness and prosperity may hang, and after all, this
time, it may change for the worse with no input from us.

Wednesday, May 17, 2017

TRUMP IMPEACHMENT: A FALSE HORIZON

By Gilbert Morris:

Pundits, Democrats and drunkards
have been predicting Trump's election loss, his criminal indictment and
his impeachment since he launched his fatiguing indefatigable campaign
and assault on the American presidency. They will be proven wrong!

Let's get at the FACTS:

Mr. Trump and his cohorts enjoyed an unusual degree of coziness with
the Russian security establishment, as that establishment hacked into US
campaigns and passed information to Wikileaks.

Wikileaks distributed that information just in time to influence an
electorate that already regarded Mrs Clinton somewhat askance.

Then
come Comey bearing letters and his soul, tiefing up Mrs Clinton's last
bit of credibility, and this and the Russians and Wikileaks all
occurring just in time to blunt or even soften Mr Trump's
crotch-grabbing boasts.

So we accept that the Russians through
Wikileaks's, together with Comey impacted American voter perception just
before an American election; AND: Trump's people were canoodling with the Russians the entire time! AND: Trump's people lied about that canoodling.

Again comes Comey, investigating the affair, forcing General Flynn, The
US Attorney General, hosts of Trumpian lackeys and his son-in-law to
admit, that they were part of the "Stolichnaya Breakfast Club"!

Trump - who has not been told no since he was four years old - accosted Comey, and begged of him, "Let Flynn go...!"

Is that Obstruction of Justice?

Mmmmmmmm, depends...

It requires a set of compelling circumstances:

So, Flynn gets fired.

Comey announces investigation.

Trump and his people denounce the investigation publicly. Gets the
House Intelligence Chairman to call media houses to counteract Comey's
claims.

Trump calls Comey, asks am I going to jail?

Trump meets Comey and says repeat John 3:16, but replace the "only begotten son" with Trump!

Trump invites Comey for dinner, says you want to stay at FBI?

Trump says drop this investigation!

Yes!

It's abuse of power, obstruction even bribery.

What it lacks is a systematic scheme to frustrate the interests of justice and it is so disorganized that it is hardly a crime.

Thursday, April 20, 2017

PRESENTATION AT THE HUMAN RIGHTS FORUM AT THE UNIVERISITY OF THE BAHAMAS

April 7, 2017

By: Joseph Darville

VP Grand Bahama Human Rights Association

The Israelites, the Bible states, wondered forty years in the desert. It’s not that they were physically lost, for they knew where they were headed, and knew how to get there. The stars by night and the sun by day were the only GPS they needed. And they were fortified by manna in the desert.

But woefully, that nation of people was mentally and psychologically lost. Leaving the land of enslavement, after coming to the realization that as a people of value and dignity, they no longer cherished the ungodly treatment meted out to them. Yet, having subjected themselves for so long to this bondage, they were infused with the consciousness of enslavement at the very core of minutest parts of their being.

By Divine grace and a genetic transformation, they came to realize that no entry into the promised land was possible until every iota of mental slavery was exorcised from the very foundation of their being. It could have taken them but a mere sixty days by foot to reach their ultimate physical goal. But as long as forty years were necessary to wipe out the vestiges of enslavement.

Four decades, yes, it took them to wipe clean their minds and hearts, that long, indeed before old habits died out. The very genetic recalibration had to take place. Even the great Moses was never allowed to enter the promised land. He and the other “old” heads had to literally die out and take with them the residual of the consciousness of slavery, for indeed, a consciousness of enslavement cannot ever enter the Promise Land.

For many years too, we were enslaved. Almost two hundred years ago, the physical shackles tumbled from our ankles, and we began our wandering in the desert of human reconstruction, not really knowing who we were or where we wanted to go. But yet, like the Israelites, we knew intuitively, and our souls cried out in desperation for our promise land.

But the sounds and sensation of those damn shackles kept us in mental bondage. Even now, and after forty plus years of political independence, the curse of enslavement still hangs around our necks. And if we listen very quietly, we can still hear the hammering and the clinging of those despicable physical shackles.

For fear of retribution, many, too many of us, cling to the old vestiges of the plantation. Our masters now, only having changed color, and having elevated themselves to the status of demi-gods, have so fine-tuned their capricious power and control over us, that mental enslavement has become their special art. Thus, our promise land is nowhere even on the horizon.

So, my lamentation is that we are more enslaved now under our own native leaders than we were under our white slave masters. Please excuse my expression, but the ‘black nigga” syndrome of slaving on the plantation, without any notion of our singular rights, is very much alive in this nation, both for poor blacks and whites.

In such a state of affairs, one can conclude that the state of human rights in this nation is defunct, not even in ICU, but in rigor mortis, having for too long under gone the rites of extreme unction (last rites). Sadly, we have yet to see the birth of real freedom in this land. As a matter of fact, if what has been now called the Spy Bill had been passed, our individual freedom especially of privacy and public utterances would have been drastically curtailed, if not totally abolished. It would have indeed further shackled our most precious gift of freedom to express.

Individually, we are very proud people, and we love our Bahamaland. However, a child given a piece of candy, when she deserve a full meal, is also very happy and proud. Essentially, we have gotten rid of one set of slave masters and embraced another; and that “another” is even more pernicious. For when our own, knowledgeable about every iota of our psyche, enslave us, they do so with even more vengeance, for they have fine-tuned the technique of psychological enslavement as an art.

At the rate we’re going, or really, not moving, we may achieve true freedom and independence by 2041, when I’m 100 years old. In other words, we will take five times longer than it took the Israelites. I pray I’m still alive to witness that illusive reality.

We are an independent people, and as such should have the freedom, the right and ability, even obligation to structure and build one by one our beautiful communities. We can then become the envy of island nations, the glory of our own nation and the focus of the world. Our beauty, of both people, land, and sea with their natural and abundance of resources, are all we need to become all that the Good and Great Creator meant us to be. But we will recognize and accept this reality only when we are REALLY independent, really free, relying on those wonderful gifts so bountifully bestowed upon us by our loving Creator.

The Good and Gracious Creator gives to each and every one of us all that is essential, not just for our survival, but enough to prosper and grow together as wonderful reflection of his glory and power.

First we have to recognized what we have been bountifully given, give thanks for it all, and them work to create a fruitful and enjoyable life for everyone else. Selfishness, greed, and false pride must be removed from our hearts, and replaced with joy, thanksgiving and the ultimate gift of unconditional sharing. Dreadfully, our political leaders, embracing wholeheartedly the colonial mentality, know not such an enlightened path.

When Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment are meted out to our defenseless citizens, with impunity, even when our constitution and the UN Declarations of Human Rights, forbids such, we are again embedded in the plantation syndrome. From the some thirty articles, simple and yet profound, in the United Nation Declarations, and to which our nation is a signatory, some nineteen of them are contravened and denied on a daily basis in this nation. When our disciplined forces are so uninformed, or simply calloused, in these matters, brutal and dehumanizing treatment of our citizenry, as well as those who enter our shores from other nearby nations, become the norm.

Beating of suspects by the very ones designated to protect our safety, as if they were only useless black niggas is carried out with impunity, no accountability; only when someone actually dies does an individual family member become sufficiently incensed or is courageous enough to report brutal and dehumanizing treatment. And then, even then, the course to justice is literally a nightmare.

But these reprehensible acts come to light from time to time, as has occurred recently in the cases of the despicable treatment of Cuban and other nationals in the detention centre. Consequently, our national and international image sank deeper and deeper into the abyss and the quagmire of ignominy.

Yet the most sad thing about this matter, in the present STATE OF THE NATION, is that for those who can excuse such behavior, mistakenly on our behalf, view even the expression of “human rights” with anger and vengeance. We, rights defenders, are seen as being anti-Bahamas, devious, infidels, subversive, carrying out treasonous acts against the state. That my sisters and brothers, spells out clearly the state of human rights in our nation. Thus, this legitimate arm of any civilized and democratic society has to be practiced mainly underground for fear of threats, ridicule and retribution.

Without even keeping in mind the serious physical actions brought against individuals in society at the hands of law enforcement personnel, the daily life of citizens of this nation is burdened with a plethora of uncertainties.

One does not share in the daily decisions which fundamentally affect our lives. Our leaders play the secrecy game, making decisions which often create havoc, fear and apprehension in the nation. They take umbrage in the fact that there is no Freedom of Information Act yet enacted. We are thus subjected to the old colonial civil servant secrecy law, and thus in all matters, confidential or not, we only become aware of them and the consequences of these many decisions after the fact, when our lives have been seriously impacted.

This again, is in the order of the old plantation regime, keeping us ignorant, uninformed, and thus our masters can ride higher and higher on their thrones of pontification, in the name of “divine right of kings.” We are under the illusion that we live and operate in a participatory democracy; this is, in fact, a fallacy, and illusion.

The system of democracy we exercise in this land remains one of psychological enslavement; we daily obey our maters for fear of retribution. As a matter of fact our leaders aim to become plutocrats (rich), and rule as if we were an oligarchy (ruled by the wealthy), and not a democracy. Whether they be ecclesiastical or political leaders, they are our servants and not demi-gods who rule with a condemning iron fist.

The Commission on the reform of our Constitution states the following in reference to freedom of information:

“ 15.11 A corollary of the right of free speech is the right to have access to public information. The right of free expression embraces the right to impart and receive information. Thus it is not surprising that some Constitutions link the right of freedom of information to that of free speech. Some provide for extensive rights of freedom of information, such as the South African model, which provides a right of access to information held by the state (art.32). Others do not elevate it to a constitutional right, but have adopted freedom of information laws. It would be difficult in a common law system, where legislation dealing with official secrets, breach of confidence legislation and the regulations governing the public service still pertain, to grant a constitutional right to government- held information. But the Commission is of the view that some form of statutory regime should provide the citizen with the access to information needed for the proper functioning of a democracy.”

One by one, our civic, human and natural rights are denied in so many ways, resulting in many of our brother and sisters suffering relentlessly. And according to my venerable friend, and veteran poetic prophet, Etienne Farquharson: we have been shackled with the 7D’s: disregard, disrespect, deceit, dishonesty, denial, disorder, and culminating with the seventh D: DAMNATION. You may wish to add more D’s.

These are the modern-day shackles inhibiting our way forward; aware of our fundamental freedom and rights under the constitution and international protocols, the frustration of enslavement becomes even more malicious.

The contravention of our basic human, civic and social rights, are mainly perpetrated by official agencies of the state. As was stated in the human rights report, a few years ago the UN in referencing to cruel and dehumanizing treatment of persons:

“The constitution prohibits such practices, but human rights monitors and members of the public expressed concern over continued instances of police abuse of criminal suspects. Police officials, while denying systematic or chronic abuses, acknowledged that police on occasion abused their authority.

There were other allegations of police beatings and brutality throughout the year. The government stated that no official complaints were received, in reference to many of these allegations. Victims' families and community activists claimed that many officers had their cases thrown out of court or dropped by the Attorney General's Office. In addition, many officers waited years for their court date, only to return to work without having their names cleared.”

With a large percentage of our citizens living at the level of subsistence, and many even below that, too few have the means to fight for, defend or legally afford the costs to maintain or regain their fundamental rights as citizens in a democratic society. These abuses will continue unabated until sufficient numbers of our citizens wake up, realize and accept their individual freedom. So until then, expect the carnage to continue, due to ignorance of our national and international rights: acts which result in the maiming of our citizens, even to the finality of death; desecration, pillage, raping of our environmental heritage by foreign entities, like what took place and still presently taking place in Bimini; the dispossession of our crown land generally without our knowledge; the fallacy that our leaders have infallible rights to do as they please without consultation of the citizenry. This is the very antithesis of a true and participatory democracy.

Yes, we do elect leaders every five years, but then, soon after, we go into a catatonic state, mesmerized, hypnotized, seduced by the trickery, deception of our leaders, as we fall prey to their almost despotic rule. Then again, after five long years we awaken from our slumber. With the enticement of plenty liquor, money, adorned with T-shirts and an abundance of Bahamian food, we become aggressively passionate again, elect others or the same individuals; then we’re back into our slumbering state, ruled by our masters, having again reaffirmed their continued power base of domination.

Oh, how our psyche loves to be ruled; it is indeed so much easier to be ruled, ordered and subjugated to the will of our masters. They are no longer our servants, but our indomitable plantation slave masters. And thus continues the regime of banana republic politics.

My brothers and sisters, all the acts which undermine our fundamental rights are the basis of much of the malaise, crime in our nation. A people who have no sense of ownership, power or participation in the national life are easily led to feed on and destroy the nation. Thus, the level of murders, the rape and pillage of our women and children. As has been so truthfully stated, “society prepares the crimes and individuals commit them.”

Did you know that in 2010, the Bahamas was declared by the United Nation to have the highest per capita in the world for rape, some 133 in 100,000. And those are just the reported cases. The way we treat our women and children marks the manner of our bearing. I cannot imagine at this moment the statistics! But who pays attention when our beloved women still cannot officially be recognized as equal to men in this nation. And our LBGT Community becomes the vicious prey of religious bigots.

Our environmental rights are daily being eroded in the manner our lands and seas are offered to the highest bidder, irrespective of the pillage, rape and devastation which can result. All of this again is carried out in secrecy, and I’ve already addressed one of the prime example in the utter and on-going destruction of the beautiful gem in the ocean, Bimini.

These are our lands, sea, sea coast and seabed and they should not be sold, given away, or in any way used unless benefitting us, the Bahamian people. So states the legislation governing crown land. By virtue of the stewardship of these islands, we have a serious responsible to safeguard this heritage patrimony for thousands of generations to come; it is our right and privilege; and, thus, a national and fundamental and individual right. We should aim to protect and preserve for the generations from whom we are borrowing them.

The Freedom of Information movement is embedded in Universal Declaration of Human Rights developed by the United Nations in 1948. The guiding principle is based upon four freedoms: Freedom of speech; Freedom of religion, Freedom from want; and Freedom from fear.

In further expounding on freedom from fear, it states:

“Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”

If our people do not wake up soon, and very soon, we will continue to be doomed and sacrificed on the altar of political expediency. Our voices need to be heard and not simply on talk shows, but in practical, meaningful, and dynamic ways. If ever we needed a quiet, peaceful, non-violent revolution, it is NOW! We labor under the calloused burden of unrighteous taxation with, certainly no representation, but even more so without consultation. Information is power, and we need to know every fundamental right we should enjoy as a human being, citizen of this Commonwealth, and actually citizen of the world.

We have by virtue of the ignorance of our fundamental rights, have inadvertently sold our freedom to the calloused, indifferent and corrupt demagogues. They tread upon us furiously, as if it were their legal prerogative.

As someone has so truthfully stated in historical perspective:

Apartheid was legal

The Holocaust was legal

Slavery was legal

Colonialism was legal

Legality is a matter of POWER, not justice.

Thus, it is not righteousness or justice which governs our nation, but rather power and that unrighteous power breeds corruption without limitation.

I encourage more individuals, especially the young, to become educated, informed, committed and passionate about leading this Commonwealth into the promise land, “God’s Kingdom come on Earth”, as promised by Jesus Christ. According to His admonition, we are not independent until our spirits are free and all fear is removed from our hearts! Until then, we are nothing but slaves in our masters' vineyards. Fear not my sisters and brothers, fear not; do not even fear itself, for then that is still fear!

The Good and Gracious Creator gives to each and everyone of us all that is essential, not just for our survival, but enough to prosper and grow together as wonderful reflection of his glory and power.

About the Author: Joseph Darville is a native of Long Island, Bahamas and a resident of Freeport, Grand Bahama. He is the founding member and past president of the Bahamas Counselor's Association; past president of the Bahamas Mental Health Association and the Grand Bahama Mental Health Association; founding member and past president, and presently Vice-President, of the Grand Bahama Humane Rights Association; founding member and presently co-chairman of the Bahamas National Drug Council; a founding member of the Caribbean Human Rights Network; past VP of the Caribbean Federation of Mental Health; founding member and chairman of Operation Hope, [volunteer drug prevention, education & rehabilitation program]; and an administrative VP of the Freeport YMCA. Joseph is a past VP of the Bahamas Union of Teachers and taught at the St. Augustine's College in Nassau as well as at Queens' College, where he was also a guidance counselor; principal of Grand Bahama Catholic High School from 1977-1997. He is an advanced master/teacher in Reiki training, a natural energy healing method, as well as a teacher of Transcendental Meditation. He has received many awards for outstanding service and achievement in teaching, communication, and citizenship, including the 25th year of independence Commonwealth of the Bahamas Citizen’s Award. He now serves as a director/Chairman of the Coalition to Save The Bays, and presently Board Chairman for the Grand Bahama Humane Society. Joseph is married to Melanie and they have two children, and four grand children. Joseph can be reached at: jldarville@savethebasys.bs

If you observed the diplomatic meetings in Moscow today, there was a
masterclass in the art of diplomacy and sheer Alpha Dog swagger by The
Hon. Sergey Lavrov - Russian Foreign Minister and The Hon. Rex Tillerson
- Secretary of State of the United States of America.

First, the
"bone of contention" was the hellish situation in Syria; most notably
the alleged use of chemical weapons that outraged the selective
conscience of President Trump; unmoved previously by 161 uses of
chemical weapons. But 162 simply got his goat.

The nexus (where two
diplomatic parties cite their disagreement was that Russia had assured
the world that it had rid Syria of these weapons. As such, their use
meant that either:

a. Russia was incompetent and failed to rid Syria of the weapons, or
b. Syria tricked Russia, or
c. Russia was complicit in Syria's use of these weapons, or
d. It's was all a false flag for Mr Trump to change the subject

Second, the clever student of strategic logic or foreign policy need
not come to a conclusion here, but merely master the ability to raise
credible questions and present both pre-texts and plausible explanations
for each option.

Sean Spicer - the embattled, forever yelling,
fidgety - White House press secretary, Rex Tillerson and President Trump
all had differing explanations both for the Russian role in Syria;
Assad's culpability in the use of chemical weapons and the meaning of US
policy in the circumstance; the substance of which is yet to be
articulated.

In foreign policy, every move a country makes must either:

I. Support and advance national interests
Ii. Impose, maintain or advance a "balance of power"
III. Confirm or advance a set of values

I defy anyone to show me which of those options have been revealed in US statements or actions.

But today there was indeed an alpha dog Zen master and he was Sergey
Lavrov, and by extension Vladimir Putin. Here is what he (they) did
today:

a. They blurred the moral lines of US policy by listing
off half a dozen examples of US invasions of other nations which ended
in disaster.
b. They raise questions concerning the lack of
intellectual basis of the US's "trigger happy" military interventions,
which seem content to blow things up, but lack the capacity to manage
what they insist on bombing.
c. They sowed doubt about US
commitments; reminding Europeans of Mr Obama's reticence and Mr Trump's
raving mad flourishes concerning NATO.
d. They "took the wind" out
of US claims - easing reasonable doubts - about US certainty that
chemical weapons were used in Syria; reminding them poignantly about
false claims of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Lavrov even
showed himself the dominant dog in the room, reminding an American
reporter of her manners as Mr Rex Tillerson sat bewilderingly mute like a
cafeteria security guard.

In fact, Tillerson's tone changed from
chastising Russia, to expressing concern that Syria was being so
deceitful as to undermine Russian credibility, which is crucial - in
Tillerson's words, to any solution to the crisis.

I do not
necessarily agree with Lavrov in any particular. But those of you
aspiring to high office, wanting to hold offices requiring a defence of
the country - at which we have failed miserably in financial services
for instance - Lavrov's approach came from knowing every background
fact, understanding and cultivating pre-texts (the most important
strategic skill in any public facing endeavour, which we lack in every
degree), whilst planting a credible oppositional narrative in the minds
of all observers.

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Processed Meat From Brazil Banned

By AVA TURNQUEST

Tribune Chief Reporter

aturnquest@tribunemedia.net

THE
MINISTRY of Agriculture and Marine Resources yesterday announced a ban
on all processed meat imports from Brazil for the next two months as a
precaution following the shocking bribery scandal unfolding in the South
American country.

The
government of Brazil has suspended exports from 21 meat-processing
units due to food inspectors taking bribes to allow sales of rotten and
salmonella-tainted meats.

“To
safeguard public health and food safety in the Bahamas,” a ministry
press statement read, “the Minister for Agriculture and Marine
Resources, the Hon V Alfred Gray, has announced a precautionary ban of
meat imports from Brazil.

“Until
further notice, no permits for the importation of processed meat
products from Brazil will be issued. This includes corned beef as well
as other beef products and beef by-products.

“The
Ministry of Agriculture and Marine Resources will continue to monitor
this issue over the next 60 days and should we be satisfied that imports
from Brazil be resumed, it would be with the following proviso: beef
must be slaughtered and processed at an approved Government abattoir and
processing facility; a Sanitary certificate should accompany all
imports from Brazil; inspection of all batch containers be done at the
Port of Entry; an Import Permit must be sought by all importers from the
relevant Government agency; and a registry must be compiled of all
importers of beef and beef products from Brazil.”

Almost 3 and a half years ago, I wrote in the NATION NEWSPAPER with a heavy heart for Barbados: here is what I said:

Professor Gilbert Morris December 13, 2013 at 7:40 PM

“The Minister of Finance for Barbados has issued a comprehensive Short
Term Growth & Sustainability programme. It will not work.”

I am constrained to say I TOLD YOU SO!

The difficulty for Barbados – as with the rest of the Caribbean – is
that we inherited a command and punish economic model, that was meant
for controlling ostensibly brainless people of whom nothing was
expected. Our innovation across the region was to add cronyism and the
facilitation of lackeys at the expense of our bright young
entrepreneurial minds. As such, across the region, we have produced an
economic model that is scloretic, for which our politics have become the
tribal art of attempting to defend obvious nonsense.

Our people
know now that their chance of becoming their best selves and living
their best lives is not at home, where – in Barbados as much as anywhere
else in the region – successive governments have succeeded in
cultivating a caste system, incompatible not only with the moral
imperatives of our relevant histories, but also with the yearning,
ambition and native genius of our peoples.

Barbados has lead the world in Literacy Rates, but to what purpose?

Bajans regale themselves with their comparative successes in the mark book, but where is the “silicon valley”?

Barbados needs a comprehensive rethink.

It’s future lies NOT a stale inert economic model that has produced one
billionaire and a host of rent-seeking lackeys in 40-odd years.

The crisis is now in the home stretch: Barbados bond yields led a global
spike and now ranks with the Republic of Congo; its debt is 135% of
GDP; and its reserves have fallen to half a billion; shockingly merely
2.5 months of imports. (They need to cook with steam, for Chrissake!)
Whilst it's interest payments are just over $50 million this year, Janet
Yellen is likely to raise interest rates again this year. Barbados 2022
maturities have risen 146 basis points since January 20th 2017.
Moreover, BREXIT impacts, crony run public institutions and domestic
debt are likely to balloon next year.

A similar fate awaits the Bahamas.

HERE IS WHAT TO DO:

Start over. Rescind all oversight commissions!

Appoint My good friend Sir Courtney Blackman and 16 others to a
National Steering Committee and manage this crisis for the next 6 months
with a maximum of transparency, with the power to subpoena persons and
papers for public testimony on all fiscal and economic issues.

Hold National Public Discussion about the current and Future of
Barbados; deal with structural issues that limit or prevent Bajans from
achieving their best lives in their own country.

Cut government spending now!

End all feckless liberal-minded enterprise projects, which just pay
lackeys at the expense of efficiency and true achievement (Compare
Singapore, which seeds parastatal corporations and then let’s them sink
or swim and if they cannot produce financials they are foreclosed
immediately by the Treasury).

Give EVERY Bajan who wants a
business license to establish a business aimed at export, licensee fee
and tax exemption for 10 years.

Move all government routine
processes – drivers & business licenses, government fees and other
processes to eGovernment platform immediately.

Convert all government payments to blockchain using Bitcoin or other electronic alternatives.

Place all government owned infrastructure and land into a sovereign
fund, 60% held by Bajan citizens, then JV with a global strategic
partner.

Eliminate the Ministry of Tourism.

Convince all CARICOM nations to withdraw from the WTO.

Open Harrison College to South Americans for Boarding school.

JV with Guyana to fund a super trade highway into Brazil, to provide a
staple of Brazilian products to the Caribbean, to compete with Florida.

Set up Barbadian International Business Centre with Arbitration and commercial services for South American business.

Establish a 100 acres area as a tax free zone for international data storage and management.

The first options must be to reduce government expenses, and reduce the
cost of doing business in Barbados, which has one of every tax in the
history of mankind.

Reduce governments tax share of GDP to below 18%.

Use timing options for initiatives, which allows government to maximize
policy options squeezing out efficiencies, then switch to more
sustainable programmes.

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

AN IMPORTANT DISCUSSION HAS EMERGED SURROUNDING INFLOWS OF FDI IN THE
BAHAMAS, lead by our own young prince Professor Peter Blair, moderated
by our own Lester R Cox - including bright Bahamian thinkers like Lynden R. Nairn & Hubert Edwards and others. I make this small contribution for which some friends have asked a repost.

"I think there has been some misunderstanding of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and some people have misread what Professor Peter Blair has said in his recent presentation.

First, look specifically at the top four nations receiving FDI INFLOWS
(EU, China Hong Kong & USA), now look at their growth rates: The EU
with the highest FDI inflows has the lowest growth rate. China, with the
highest growth rate has the lowest FDI of the top four nations.

Of
course these are relative & constitutive issues and limiting
factors in any comparison; but Papua New Guinea, the Congo, Ethiopia and
Turkmenistan enjoy the highest growth rates in the world; but with the
exception of Ethiopia, investors are not flocking there.

Yet,
neither growth rates nor FDI inflows indicate, NECESSARILY, the actual
prosperity which Bahamians have been promised and for which they are
waiting.

Let's try a thought experiment: Imagine, say INFOSYS - the
Indian tech giant - decided to invest $100 billion in building 50
industrial grade Data Centres in the Bahamas. Suppose they required
specialists to build and once built the centres required only 50 people
(all foreigners with exotic high tech post graduate qualifications to
manage them), with a maintenance crew of 20, including 10 Bahamians. The
government would register that as $100 billion in FDI inflows, but its
"dead value" and would do nothing to generate the sort of growth that
produces PROSPERITY.

There would be no transactional nexus, from which local consumption would be generated no matter how much money it made.

Let's try another thought experiment for the opposite case: Imagine a
former Green Beret, expert in coding and information systems &
network security, gets with 10 friends, retires to the Bahamas. Imagine
that he and his friends teach 300 young Bahamians coding, encryption and
mathematical logic on weekends and evenings for 3 years. Imagine that
this leads to the development of 50 high tech web security firms and
they gain $300 million in electronic security contracts for Banking.

This would not be classified as FDI, but would impact our economic
growth rate and power local consumption, generating that prosperity,
which Bahamians desire rightly.

What Professor Blair showed was not
whether FDI was good or bad or even necessary. HERE IS WHAT HE
DEMONSTRATED BRILLIANTLY: a.That our having leaned on FDI inflows in
disproportion to development for instance, has resulted in nebulous
quantifiable advantages; b. That we have no means of measuring the
efficiency of FDI as a driver of growth; and c. Therefore we have been
lurching to & fro, using FDI inflows to cover a multitude of sins,
operating without a strategy.

The Deep State of entrenched senior officials combined with Senators and Representatives being blackmailed and bribed to betray the Republic.

You are not under attack from Iran or Russia – all your existential fights are right here.

There are four things you need to do immediately in order to survive:

Switch out Preibus and Flynn — smart choices for
the transition, they are undermining you now, Tillerson and Mattis
probably agree they both need to go. You need a loyal Chief of Staff who can manage complexity, and a National Strategy Advisor with balance.

Introduce the Electoral Reform Act of 2017
and demand that it go through – this is the only way you will survive
the looming demise of the Republican Party; the only way you legitimize
your accidental 27% presidency with a majority of the public; and the
only way you free Members from foreign and financial community bribery
and blackmail.

Create the non-profit educational Trump Channelbacked up by an Open Source Agency. Clear
the existing press area in the White House, turn that into Trump
Studios, and offer a daily fireside chat as well as short daily briefs
by your principals in turn on each threat, each policy, each budget –
bypass the fake news media, educate the public, and use PollMole to see what 200 million think on a Presidential Dashboard.

Unleash the FBI, with NSA support, against the Deep State.
You may have already started this, the Republican and Democratic Party
pedophiles are the Achilles heel. We can isolate 500 other embedded
traitors (financial, religious, ideological) in 90 days.

There are four things you can do to be the greatest President in modern history.

Diversify your senior team – adding Cynthia
McKinney and Dennis Kucinich – and Ralph Nader and Jesse Ventura in some
capacity – will strangle the extreme left and open up the middle. Take
your diversified team on the road – 50 states in 30 days.

Organize a Grand Strategy Summit, televised for
public consumption – the ultimate reality show. The last one was done in
1953 by Ike Eisenhower. Address all high level threats and all Cabinet
policy domains in context of achieving a balanced budget.

Organize a Revenue Summit, televised for public consumption, in which you invite Dr. Edgar Feige of Wisconsin to brief his idea of an Automated Payment Transaction Tax that allows you to eliminate all other taxes, especially income taxes.
This fractional tax puts the tiny burden where it should be: on Wall
Street instead of Main Street. Allow the public to scrutinize the
alternatives you have been considering. You will be a hero.

Invite every citizen in debt to sign a Debt Renunciation Pledge
on a non-profit website, authorizing you to negotiate, on their behalf,
a reduction of the three trillion dollars in student debt, elderly
medical debt, and small business and family credit card debt. This will
connect you to 150 million or more citizens and empower you against Wall
Street.

Saturday, February 4, 2017

Unlike men with political ambition, Jose Marti was a man with
political ambition with a difference: a difference that propels a
political activist, poet, journalist and teacher to attain national
heroic status in the Republic of Cuba. Born in 1853, Jose Marti became a
known activist against established foreign institutions and powers that
dominated Cuba. He suffered and labored for the people notwithstanding
the level of oppression by colonial powers against him and his people.
No wonder he wrote that "Men of action, above all those whose actions
are guided by love, live forever. Other famous men, those of much talk
and few deeds, soon evaporate." His love for his people is immeasurable
and profound, without form and shape and not bounded by any potential
personal gain.

Jose Marti’s dedicated and zealous pursuit of
freedom resulted in many incarceration with authorities right from an
early age of 17 when he was exiled to Spain for being vociferously
against the colonial rule suppression of the people of Cuba and
exploiting the natural resources of Cuba.

Jose Marti
selflessly took up the task of educating the people of Cuba to
contradict the political system of the colonial powers in order to raise
awareness with the generality of the people of Cuba to stand up for
their rights. He used his expertise in poetry, and journalistic edge to
advance his fight for the freedom of the Republic of Cuba from foreign
domination.

Most interestingly, Jose Marti was very plain in
denouncing the lack of spirituality and arrogance in the colonial
powers’ approach to the manipulation of Cuba. He was strongly in support
of democratic principles that will provide and assure ordinary Cubans
the greater national security, respect of dignity of being a Cuban.

His zeal for the development of Cuba and freeing Cuba from the
domination led him to leave the shores of the US (where he had flee to
avoid the retribution of colonial masters) to join the war in Cuba for
the independence of Cuba.

Jose Marti was a man with courage to
leave his comfort in the US to fight for his people without concern of
his personal safety, but with vision of the future of the free Republic
of Cuba.

Against advice from friends and well-wishers for his
welfare and safety and his lack of military training, Jose Marti
valiantly went to Cuba to fight the war in favor of his beloved country,
which resulted in his death. This conforms to his philosophy
that "just as he who gives his life to serve a great idea is admirable,
he who avails himself of a great idea to serve his personal hopes of
glory and power is abominable, even if he too risks his life. To give
one's life is a right only when one gives it unselfishly.”

Jose
Marti was one of the most prolific writers in the Hispanic world that
helped to transform Cuban arts and cultures. He was a man of great ideas
and philosophy that was ahead of his peers.

His vision and
thoughts were innovative and constructive to help the development of
democracy in Cuba, as he wrote in one of his famous quote that: ”like stones
rolling down hills, fair ideas reach their objectives despite all
obstacles and barriers. It may be possible to speed or hinder them, but
impossible to stop them."

In the views of Jose Marti, “the
struggles waged by nations are weak only when they lack support’…wisdom
and the ability to insist on agreement."

This is not political -
it's perversity. It is not even the Superego judging the Ego. It is
our own capacity for hate, increasing until it becomes a kind of
compulsion - neurosis where reverence and destruction alternate and we
reverently destroy. We falter and faint and deny him thrice.

We develop sympathy at the expense of loyalty. I don't like it. It just ain't right.
Where is the outcry? We have become silent spectators,
eagerly awaiting our daily dose of public scandal, noisy expulsions and
excommunications especially from misinformation from the social media.
the Neo - con is in charge they are not play with us, misinformation.

''A man must swallow a toad every morning if he wishes to be sure
of finding nothing still more disgusting before the day is over.''
(Morley)

We must stop this. It's not right. There
is no honour in this battle. There is no dignity in this death. There
are no victors on this battleground of shame. Only a man with the
shield of Perseus against the ghosts of character assassination. By the
Neo -Con Racism!

''Whatever you blame, that you have done
yourself.'' (Groddeck) There is no hate without fear. Hate is the
consequence of fear. We hate what we fear and so where hate is, fear is
lurking.

We must stop this moth-and-candle preoccupation with
hate, this triumph of resentment, this abuse of intellect, this
perversion of the heart that obliterates our knowledge of the purpose of
life; that denies the God within us, wantonly exterminated. I don't
like it. It just ain't right.

"Trumpism" is coming to destroy all of us; we must fight against this - and also never forget the the words of brother Jose Marti .

The world failed to respond to this abhorrent issue, of Trumpism
Neo-con Foolish. According to E. M Forster:”if I had to choose between
betraying my country and betraying my friend, I hope I should have the
guts to betray my friend”. It is imperative that our Cabinet
Ministers understand the significance of this games that Trumpism has
instigated against the World and Mexico.

Let’s not forget that
our greatest friend is our greatest nightmare: that is the United States
of America. They enjoy the art of propaganda and manipulation.

President Fidel Castro said in an address on the celebration of the
51st Anniversary of the Attack on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de
Cedspedes Fortresses, “I shall address a sinister character that keeps
threatening, insulting and slandering us. This is not a whim or an
agreeable option; it is a necessity and a duty”